It looks like I’ll be burning the midnight oil on Christmas Eve.

When a Christmas package was delivered to our house, my 2-year-old princess ran, grabbed her keys and tried with all her might to carve the box open.

After her failure to open the box, she begged me to open it for her. I had to look inside and tell her the store sent an empty box. Needless to say, the screaming and crying began, followed by the comment, “Come on man.”

With her persistence no wrapped Christmas gift will be safe or untouched under our Christmas tree. Luckily, big brother is at school all day and it is much easier to hide his presents. Maybe he’ll keep the Christmas gift mystery alive, but I highly doubt it.

I hope I have a lot of hiding places and plenty of boxes to hide their presents!

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My 4-year-old son is an artist. Throughout our house his art work is displayed. We have original drawings of houses taped to our dining room wall. In our living room, we have a beautiful rendition of Christmas trees. He has a wonderful imagination.

I love his creativity. For Christmas I asked my mother-in-law for an easel as a gift for him. The reviews are not so great for the easels that look great and have everything I want. Plus, my husband hates toys that clutter. I’m sure he will love the kitchen my family purchased for our kids.

Frustrated, I checked out amazon and saw the Crayola Glow Dome.  We have the Crayola 3-D Chalk and my son loves it. Overall, I am very happy with Crayola products.

The Crayola Glow Dome description:

With various light and rotation settings, the Crayola Color Explosion Glow Dome brings drawings to life with the illusion of animation. A fun, new interactive way to draw, the clear Glow Dome and inside panel become see-through canvases for creating imaginative scene. Using colored glow markers, the dome lights up drawings when turned on. This award-winning toy is fun for one, two, or even three friends to play with at a time.

The Crayola Glow Dome may be the answer to my easel dilemma. It’s compact in size and won’t be an eyesore. My son can keep the creativity flowing and my walls can be tape free.

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Two years ago, I bought my then 2-year-old son a pair of velcro etnies for Christmas.

Not exactly the Christmas gift every boy dreams of, but I loved them. The shoes were black with a red outlined E. His shoes looked great on him.

He was able to wear the etnies for two years. The velcro made it easy for an independent toddler to get his shoes on and off all by himself.

This year I plan on purchasing brown etnies for my son. Last year I looked everywhere for a pair, but was unable to find his size.  Brown must be a popular color for boys shoes.

I have never been a big fan of wearing athletic shoes with your clothes, but I have always loved the look of etnies with jeans. 

On the etnies website, you can Build and customize your own etnies shoes.Making a customized pair of shoes is a special gift for someone you love for the holidays.

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James Patterson calls The Murder of King Tut: The Plot to Kill the Child King – A Nonfiction Thriller. Why did he decide to go the nonfiction route? Patterson claims to have always been curious about the short life of the young Pharaoh Tutankhamen. He wanted to try to solve the mystery surrounding Tut’s death with actual facts. But did he?

Patterson presents his thesis stating King Tutankhamen was murdered by his half-sister and wife Ankhesenpaaten, his vizier Ay and his general Horemheb. Patterson believes Tut was murdered because of the power grab desired by these three individuals. Tut and Ankhesenpaaten had two still-born children with no male heir to the throne leaving Ankesenpaaten, Ay and Horemheb to reign after Tut.

Patterson wrote the novel in three distinctive parts all interwoven with one another. These short, easy-to-read chapters breeze between Tut’s life and death, the discovery of Tut’s tomb by Howard Carter and present day.

By far, my favorite chapters were the actual story of Tut’s life. These chapters pre-date Tut’s life and the follow-up after his untimely death. If you want a simple, very visual version of the history on Tutankhamen, you will enjoy these chapters.

I knew very little about Howard Carter until I read this book. The Carter chapters offer a very short and interesting read about the man consumed by finding the missing tomb of the unknown Pharaoh Tut.

The chapters concerning present day Palm Beach seemed unnecessary. I think the chapters were used to fill space and wasteful.

I enjoy Patterson’s writing style. His chapters are short, intriguing and very easy to read.

I love history and have always wanted to visit Egypt. I’m not sure how much of this fictionalized, but it is an enjoyable fast-paced novel.

The Murder of King Tut: The Plot to Kill the Child King – A Nonfiction Thriller is a great semi-fictionalized story on the boy king. It is a great gift for the amateur Egyptologist in your life.

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